Caramelized Shallot, Spinach and Goat Cheese Garlic Butter Pasta.

The it’s-the-holiday-season-so-I’m-on-a-dinner-making-strike-until-January dinner.

The truth is that.

I need a dinner intervention.

Big time.

The last few weeks, my dinner ideas have been totally SHOT. As in… not even there. Not even existing. My dinner brain is one giant black hole of nothingness. Empty. Deserted. Destitute. So full of nothing that I had to resort to a thesaurus.

The sad part is that I even knew it was coming! I predicted it. Mentioned it a few weeks ago and started brainstorming ideas in order to prevent such catastrophe and then, no.

It doesn’t matter that I have this… arsenal, per say… of nearly one thousand recipes in the form of predictable ramblings to my invisible internet friends. My brain has just quit working when it comes to ingesting good food after 3PM.

I practically can’t even heat something up in the microwave. The holidays put me in a holidaze and paralyze my mind to the point where I just eat some cheese and kale chips and a handful of peanuts while I sit in front of my computer.

I can hear 2003 calling and asking for their college dinners back.

So before I hit you with an onslaught of more party food, I made us an easy dinner. Even though at the time I took these photos it was a proper breakfast, which is half the battle, but let’s not talk about that.

The other leeeeeeettle problem may be that someone in this house got me addicted to House of Cards and we might have spend eight solid hours watching it. And doing nothing else.

(besides ordering pizza.)

This pasta is the easiest thing to come out of my kitchen lately and it only takes 30 minutes. It’s packed with flavor but not a ton of ingredients – chances are you have most of them on hand or at least something slightly resembling them. All it takes to reeeeeally make me happy is some brown butter, goat cheese and green stuff to make me feel adult-like and stuff. You know. Necessities.

Directions:

Bring water to a boil for pasta and prepare according to directions.

While the water is coming to a boil, heat a large skillet over low heat and add olive oil. Add the shallots and salt, stirring to coat. Cover and cook for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add the brown sugar and cook for 5 minutes more. Be sure that the pasta is cooking by this time.

Add the spinach to the skillet with the shallots and toss. Stir continuously until the spinach is wilted, about 5 minutes.

Heat a small saucepan over medium heat and add the butter. Whisk constantly until the butter begins to brown. The minute you see brown bits appear in the bottom of the skillet, remove it from heat and whisk for another 15 seconds. Add the minced garlic to the brown butter and whisk for 30 seconds.

Add the cooked pasta to the skillet with the spinach and shallots. Toss well, then add the garlic brown butter and toss again. Crumble the goat cheese into the pasta and stir. Sprinkle with the crushed red pepper. Serve immediately.